[Spoilers] Pindicator's Nice Thread

[pindicator]

No, nothing like that. Just thinking through the "what-if" scenario if I had. I think Gavagai attacks into Commodore's city with his units then and probably takes Goldshlagen, probably losing a third of his stack and further wounding the rest. So instead of 22 somewhat-hurt Praetorians running back to Rome it would be something more like 15 moderately-to-severely wounded Praetorians. And so what if Commodore would have been able to wipe that out with his horse archers? That would have been the perfect time to move in on Rome. Now instead I probably have to deal with the bulk of his forces and there's a possibility that Commodore snipes Rome out from under me.

At this point I feel like I have to follow through with the attack because I'm not going to get a better shot. Those praetorians are going to be damaged and I have 13 catapults to further whittle them down. What does 13 catapults do to 22 Praetorians on a hill behind 40% culture defenses? Hopefully enough.

[pindicator]

155

It might end up working out: Gavagai put his stack in Cumae to keep Commodore from pouncing on that city. This left us an opening for Rome:




With only 2 Praetorians and 1 Warrior there was a chance for my 8 horse archers. If you recall it took 3 horse archers to take the Praetorian out at Antium earlier in the game, and so I think we have that same chance now.

And things started off exactly how every other attempt at Rome had started: with my first shock unit doing ZERO damage to the defending praetorian. In fact, with my first 4 horse archers I only scored 2 hits combined. What is up with Gavagai's RNG this game!??

I probably should have quit here, but I tilted, and threw in another Horse Archer. My best C2 Shock Horcher. At 18% odds AND HE WON! Now we were back in business. We also got a Great General for the effort:




You can see the core is already cranking out horse archers to replace what I've lost. I think we stay on the horcher train until Machinery comes in and then it's full-on maces with a sprinkling of crossbows.

Back to the action: 4 horse archers left against 1 Praetorian at 86hp and 1 warrior. The next 2 horse archers chipped away at the Praetorian doing 1 hit each (1 even withdrew, smart guy). Which gave me a 50/50 flip with my 2nd to last horcher that finally saw a flip go my direction. A mop-up battle against the last warrior with my last horse archer and Rome fell!




Gavagai is going to kick himself for not leaving that catapult in the city. One more unit in Rome and the city holds for another turn. Or maybe he made the calculus and decided the catapult was more important with his stack?

The 141 gold is huge, and basically speeds along Machinery by 2 turns. Next turn we'll be able to turn on the slider and should land the tech end of t157. I thought about burning Rome, but really I would love to bleed off more units by having Gav send stuff north. My stack is going to stay 1NE of Rome so that I can't be hit first. I'll gladly swap units back and forth here, and meanwhile get together another strike force to take Arretium.




Arretium has a Praetorian and a catapult currently. If I can take that then I have my war goals accomplished ... just about 50 turns later than I had wanted.

[Thoth]

Better late than never!

What are the plans for the GS?

[pindicator]

Golden Age #2. I was really hoping to wait until Feudalism so I can swap to Vassalage, but that is probably 8-9 turn out. So now I am wondering if I put it into an Education bulb? That would be about 1700 beakers and bring Education down to about 1000 beakers, similar to a Machinery or Feudalism (roughly 6 turns to research). Or perhaps I do an Academy in the capital? Though that only makes sense while I'm in Bureaucracy and I don't expect to stay in Bureau after the next GA starts. A big reason why I want to wait for Feudalism before kicking off the next GA is because I want to get out of Bureau and hire specialists in the capital. Another reason is i need to finish Banking before that GA is done.

Better news: Gavagai didn't retake Rome on his turn. Is he just turtling or did the Praetorians start their march north? If he moves out, Commodore can snipe Cumae out from under him with the horse archers he has in Goldshlagen.

Edit: Perhaps I go Feudalism before Machinery then? I could see squeezing out Machinery > Guilds > Banking during a 12-turn GA. Adding on a 4th tech would be too much though, I fear.

Edit #2: I absolutely need to solve my happiness problems before starting the next golden age, though

[pindicator]

156

It appears Gavagai may have mentally given up. I do not blame him in the slightest: he gave a good fight in a bad situation for 100 turns.




If he hadn't emptied Arretium I might have just considered he was healing up before striking north. But pulling out of Arretium makes me think he is mentally giving the white flag. I am curious why he is putting everything in the south and not in Rome: does he think the Iron more defensible from Cumae? Does he hold a grudge against Commodore for their earlier fighting? (And if so, why no grudge against me for all I've done to him?)

All my horse archers in the area are badly wounded, so I moved one to capture the city and gave it a small escort. If Gav lets me take the city free then I'll let his units escape to the south.

I took a bit of a gamble and whipped infrastructure instead of catapults this turn. Thundercats is still going to keep pumping out 1-turn horse archers, but other cities are going to head back to infrastructure builds for now.




David the Gnome started on Universitiy of Sankore. With it being recently whipped for a War Elephant and no stone it currently is a 42-turn build. With a little bit of growth and hopefully getting Superdeath's Stone from him this will drive the timer down considerably.

Magic Science also came through on some resource trades. We traded Crab for Crab (this is a fish for fish deal, obviously) and he traded me Gold for my Spices. I expect to cancel this in 10 turns when Arretium's gold is hooked up. Indeed: I think he only gave this trade to me because he has a scout in the area and can see that I will soon control my own gold. But this was enough to get Rainbow Brite and Thundercats out of unhappiness. Still working on solving the healthiness issues... I may resort to Aqueducts.




Another event! I am really thinking about Optics after Banking now. And that would lead me straight to Astronomy...

[pindicator]

157

Gavagai must really not like Commodore. He offered me peace and then did this:




Realistically though, that is the way to go about trying to defeat us all, so I'm glad to see he hasn't thrown in the towel yet. If he can get one of us to peace out then he can focus his superior unit quality (funny thing to say for an IW unit, but there you have it) on us one at a time. I was tempted to go for the peace because then I could definitely have maces and crossbows in place in 10 turns, but I declined because I really need Arretium. After Arretium I am done and Gav can do whatever he wants in the south.




Hopefully there are not any more units inside that city next turn and we can capture it with the small force on its doorstep. Then I'll offer Gavagai peace.

Edit: After writing this I realized I can move 3 relatively healthy horse archers up to threaten Arretrium as well. So the city will definitely fall next turn.

Realistically, Nostro Azzurro (our blue?) falls next turn as it's just full of horse archers and a single longbow. Then Gavagai's forces might come up north.

I'll have Machinery finally and will be able to start maces and crossbows everywhere. Hoping for enough time to take Arretium and then stabilize with Machinery units.

Superdeath spurned my Stone deal, instead asking for 75g straight up. I wasn't quite ready to give that since I couldn't find a practical way to get that out of Wealth builds. I am going to try to ask Bing for his second stone in exchange for my marble, but if that doesn't work then next turn I'll go back to Superdeath with a counter offer. Probably 30g and 5gpt.

[Mjmd]

Out of curiosity Mr Map Kink do you think stone should be a balanced resource like other strategics. Its pretty impactful between walls and moai.

[pindicator]

Not on a random map, no.

It's not nearly as necessary as a strategic resource, and because you don't need it all the time there are opportunities for trade. I think the biggest impact is at the beginning of the game where you are under more hammer constraint and their bonuses matter more for the early impactful wonders. But at this point in the game I'm fine with not having my own source of Stone.

[pindicator]

158

Well my screenshots failed to take, but Arretium fell this turn and netted me 102g. No infrastructure but I kept it anyway. I also threw Gavagai a peace treaty, which I might regret. However it also lets me get maces and crossbows built everywhere and brought up to the front. I know he'll have a few more catapults if I give him 10 turns, but I think that's still a good tradeoff for me.

Edit: They did take but the folder didn't refresh? Or I'm still not awake yet and I was looking in the wrong folder:




I was a little worried about covering both Arretium and Rome with my catapult stack, so I cut the road 2S of Arretium this turn. Now everything that comes north will be within range of my cat stack.

With my surplus I offered Superdeath Stone for 75g. Maces & Crossbows are started almost everywhere: the capital and Thundercats are both a turn away from finishing an Aqueduct and they'll start next turn. Thundercats will be able to 2-turn maces for the foreseeable future, but it's just going to take some time for them to get over there. Now I know why 3 people have opted to go for Engineering ahead of Guilds.

If Gavagai gives peace then I probably kick the golden age off as soon as Arretium and Rome get out of revolt.

[pindicator]

Ducked back in before Gav played and pillaged the road NW of Rome as well. Now he has to go through Rome to get anywhere north of it, or get bogged down in hills.

Also noted that Superdeath took the Stone deal. This dropped the build time on UofS to 22 turns. I think a golden age will be helpful here.

Finally, I've been wondering what to make of Commodore through this. I can't imagine he's happy to see me get the easy pickings while all the praetorians stay in the south. (Will they stay in the south?) So I'm going to stay in the war - well, I've already sent a peace deal, cant' change that - but I can alway sgo back to war in 10t and raze Cumae for Commodore to resettle. I don't think going any farther south is going to be worth the diplomatic malus against my southern neighbor. But perhaps he can see me helping him mop up Gavagai and honoring what I proposed earlier for a Gavagai split.